Muskellunge
Many anglers view the “muskie” as the supreme freshwater trophy fish. Muskies are top-of-the-food-chain predators. They are never very numerous in any body of water. They grow huge in size.
They’re hard to get to bite, but when they do, they fight savagely. Muskie anglers often cast for hours or even days without getting a strike. When they finally do hook one of these fish, however, they experience one of the most difficult and exciting challenges in all of fishing. Muskies are the wild bulls of the water, and it takes great skill and dedication to land them consistently.
The muskie is a member of the pike family. It is found in natural lakes, reservoirs and streams/rivers in the Northeast, upper Midwest and southern Canada. This fish requires cool, clean water.
The muskie is cylinder-shaped, and it has a long, powerful body. Its sides are usually yellow-tinted and marked with dark blotches or bars. This fish has a fat, duck-like mouth and very sharp teeth! It feeds mainly on smaller fish, but it will also attack birds, small musk-rats and other hapless creatures that enter its domain.
Muskies typically stalk their prey alone in shallow water, around reeds, rocky shoals, quiet eddy pools in streams, and other similar spots. During warm months, they feed more in low-light periods of dawn and dusk. On cloudy days, however, they may feed anytime. One of the very best times to fish for muskies is during fall when they go on a major pre-winter feeding binge.
Muskies live many years and frequently grow beyond 35 pounds. The current world record, weighing 67 pounds 4 ounces, was caught in Wisconsin in 1949.
Since the muskie is such a vicious predator, nature has a way of keeping its numbers down so other fish have a chance to survive. The muskie is a late spawner (water temperature in the mid-50° F range). The fish that survive, however, grow to rule over their home waters. The only predator to big muskies is man.
MUSKELLUNGE
PIKE
It would be fair to call pike the “poor man’s muskie.” Members of the pike family, “northerns” are much more numerous than muskies, and they are easier to catch. By nature, pike are very aggressive, and they often attack any bright, flashy lure that swims b y.
Pike inhabit natural lakes, reservoirs, rivers and streams throughout the northeastern and north-central U.S. and most of Canada. They thrive in warm, shallow lakes or river sloughs with an abundance of water weeds.
The pike’s body is shaped like a muskie’s: long and round with the same fat, pointed mouth and sharp teeth. Its color is dark olive on the sides with light, wavy spots. Its belly is white. Pike can grow over 20 pounds. Because they’re so vulnerable to fishing pressure, big ones are usually found only in lakes off the beaten path. The world-record pike (55 pounds 1 ounce) was caught in Germany in 1986.
CHAIN PICKEREL
Pike spawn in quiet, shallow areas when the water temperature climbs into the 40° F range. After spawning, they linger around weedbeds, especially those close to sharp underwater contour changes. They are not school fish by nature, but they will cluster together if their food source is concentrated. Like muskies, they eat almost anything that swims, floats or dives. Most of the pike’s diet consists of fish, and they will attack prey up to half their own body size.
When hooked, a pike is a strong battler, rolling on the surface and shaking its head from side to side. It isn’t the most desirable table fish because of its many small bones, but anglers can learn to remove these bones during cleaning. The meat of the pike is white, flaky and tasty.
These toothy predators are a mini-version of pike and muskies. Their sides are covered with a yellowish chain pattern on a green background. They’re aggressive strikers, and they give a good fight on light tackle. Most pickerel range from 1-3 pounds, but can grow larger than this in southern habitats. The world-record chain pickerel, caught in Georga in 1961, weighed 9 pounds 6 ounces.
The grass and redfin pickerels rarely reach a foot in length. The redfin is found along the Atlantic coastal plain in small creeks and shallow ponds. The grass pickerel’s range is primarily in the Mississippi and Great Lakes drainages.
Pickerel spawn in shallow weeds as water temperatures reach the high 40° F range. Pickerel are active in cold water, and the best seasons for catching them are late fall, winter and spring. They feed primarily on small fish, so active lures like spinnerbaits, in-line spinners, spoons and floating minnow lures work well on them.
Pickerel love to lurk in weedbeds (above). Subsurface minnows (below) are always a good bet.
Pike fishing is best in spring, early summer and fall, when these fish are in quiet, weedy waters. They are normally aggressive, attacking any moving target. Look for pike in bays, sloughs, flats and coves that have submerged weedbeds, logs or other “hideout” structure. Pike like fairly shallow water—3-10 feet.
Pike can get big, and even small ones are tough fighters, so use fairly heavy tackle. (Use 12-20 pound line.) They have sharp teeth that can easily cut mono-filament. For this reason, always rig with a short steel leader ahead of your lure or bait.
Find a place that gives you access to likely cover. Cast a large, brightly-colored spoon next to or over this cover. You can cast from the bank or wade-fish, staying on the move to cover a lot of water. If you have a boat, motor to the upwind side of a shallow bay and drift slowly downwind, casting to clumps of weeds and weed edges. Retrieve the spoon steadily, but if pike don’t seem interested, pump the spoon up and down or jerk it erratically to get their attention. Other good lures for pike are large spinnerbaits, in-line spinners, large floating minnows, and wide-wobbling crankbaits.
Live-bait fishing is extremely effective. A large minnow suspended under a fixed-bobber rig is almost irresistible to pike. Clip a strong 1/0 or 2/0 hook to the end of a wire leader. Add a couple of split shot above the leader. Then add a large round bobber at a depth so the minnow will be up off bottom. Hook the minnow in the lips or back.
Cast this rig to weedlines, pockets, points or other structure. Then sit back and wait for a bite. When the bobber goes under, give the fish slack as it makes its first run with the bait. When the pike stops, reel in slack line, feel for the fish, and set the hook hard!
Use the same tactics, tackle and baits for pike in large rivers that you would use in large lakes and reservoirs. The only difference is locating these fish within the river system.
The best places to look for river pike are in back-waters. They often hold in sloughs, marshes, tributaries and oxbows away from the main channel. Cast to logs, brush or other shallow cover.
As in lakes and reservoirs, river pike are most active in spring, early summer and fall. A bonus time to fish for pike is whenever a river is rising and flooding adjacent lowlands. If you stay on the move and make a lot of casts, you’re likely to enjoy some first-rate pike action.
Northern pike, and their smaller cousins, chain pickerel, are masters of the art of ambush—fierce predators roaming the water in wolf packs. They’re not always around, and sometimes they don’t seem to be on the bite, but if you’re fishing good pike or pickerel water, you should be in for prime action. Weedy, still-water bays with deeper “escape” water nearby are where you should find the fish.
“The greediness of pike knows no bounds,” wrote Sergei Aksakov in Notes on Fishing back in 1847. Nothing has changed. As an example, note that when you’re casting in good pike water, you might see a sudden swirl some distance from where your lure plunks down on a cast. “Spooked one,” you think to yourself. No sir! You haven’t spooked anything. That pike has just launched his attack. Get set for a strike!
Pike are similar to brook trout and lake trout in that their prime environment is the great north country. If you haven’t been there, you owe it to yourself to do everything you can to plan such a trip. From Minnesota’s Boundary Waters Area and the adjoining Quetico, up through all the vast reaches of the Canadian wilderness, wolf packs of pike patrol through the cold, clean waters. This is the land of spruce, white pine, and birch; of loons calling from across the lakes; of beavers, otters, and mink; of moose and black bear. If your heart cranks up a notch or two when you think about country like this, and the fish that swim there, you’ll know you’ve just got to go.
Despite their great size and fierce disposition, northern pike sometimes seem on the sluggish side when you’re playing them. Then it happens: The pike sees the boat. It’s a whole new ball-game now; time to hold on to your hat. The pike will pull the trigger, your rod will bow into a hoop, and you’ll know you’re in a fight.
Despite their vast number of bones, pike and pickerel make absolutely delicious fried meals. The trick is to slice off the fillets with surgical skill—and a sharp fillet knife—and extract the long Y bones. Then pick through the remaining slab of clean meat for stray bones and get ready to fry ‘em up.
When fishing for pike and pickerel, watch for swirls in the water nearby just as you start your retrieve. No, you haven’t spooked a fish. On the contrary, a pike or pickerel has his prey—your bait or lure—in his sights and is moving in for the kill. Get ready!
Because they are found in so many northern latitudes, making them a Holarctic fish, northern pike can claim the distinction of being the most widely distributed freshwater fish in the world. (Now wait! Don’t try to tell me you knew what Holarctic meant!)
Because I have been fortunate to travel to fishing camps in both Canada and Alaska, I have been able to tangle with northern pike on a fly rod on several occasions, sometimes alternating between fly rod and spinning gear in the same boat. While pike aggressively hit big streamers under the right conditions, I feel the action is faster and sportier using light Spinning tackle and lures. Some anglers go all ga-ga to say they caught a fish on a fly, and if that’s your bag, go right ahead.
As much as Americans and Canadians cherish their northern pike and its fishing, you have to hand it to the Brits for downright adoration of this fish. The excellent Web site of the Pike Anglers Club of Great Britain will show you what I mean: www.www.pacgb.co.uk/.
The perfect pike spoon or spinner is the one that will wobble, flash, and give the most action at the slowest retrieving speed.
Like many another fishing “seniors,” I caught my first northern pike—and a lot since—on the classic Eppinger Dardevle—red-and-white stripes on the front and flashing, silvery nickel on the back. Today’s models, and all the assorted imitators, come in many different colors, but I always have the itch to tie on the red guy.
Letting pike know there’s prey in the water by splashing down lures and baits—and running spinner-baits alongside weedy lairs—has been an excellent technique just about forever. However, a new twist worth trying comes along every now and then. On the site of the Twin Lakes Outfitters, Nakina, Ontario, www.twin-lakes-air.com, they’re talking about doing The DareDevil Slap. That’s a name taken from the original Eppinger Dardevle, and the tactic is to cast the lure very high over your target zone, then jerk your line toward you when the bait’s 2 or 3 feet above the water. The sound of the spoon slapping the surface triggers vicious pike attacks.
Among the northern pike fishing techniques on the Web site of Twin Lakes Outfitters, Nakina, Ontario, www.twin-lakes-air.com, an idea that looks really good is to use a worn-out Rapala with a perfectly good Dardevle. Take the hooks off your broken Rapala, then attach it to a black steel leader. Attach another leader to the back of the Rapala with a spring-slip-ring, then attach your Dardevle (or whatever you want to use). The Rapala will get the pike’s attention, and the Dardevle will complete the deal.
The muskellunge (muskie) isn’t called the “The Fish of 10,000 Casts” for nothing. That number may be exaggerated; nevertheless, the muskie is indeed a trophy fish and not easy to come by, especially on artificial lures. They can be caught, however, on both lures and live bait, but the top guides who know how to do it will never call it easy.
To illustrate how difficult muskellunge fishing can be, this old anecdote has been around for a long time. Guy asks his friend, “How was your muskie trip?” His friend replies: “Oh, it was fantastic! In five days’ fishing, we had three follows.”
Writing in his “FreshWater Fishing” column in the November 1945 issue of Sports Afield, Angling Editor Cal Johnson noted that the term “mossback” really fits the muskellunge—make that big muskellunge. When muskies go 30 to 60 pounds they have a coating of dark, slimy vegetation on their backs. Small or medium muskies don’t have the “mossback” look simply because they do not spend the time lurking in the dense vegetation that the big fish do.
Big muskies feed on big baitfish. In the November 1945 issue of Sports Afield, Angling Editor Cal Johnson reports on seeing a 6-pound walleye taken from the stomach of a 35-pound muskellunge. “The very large muskie is quite inactive and moves about very little,” Johnson said. “He will go on a hunting expedition every so often and stalk and capture a large walleye pike, redhorse or big black sucker, swallowing them whole. Then he swims alongside some submerged log … or other piece of cover and lies perfectly still for several days until the food is digested.” No wonder big muskies are so hard to catch.
